A drought has forced authorities to further slash traffic in Panama Canal
westerninvestor.com
A drought has forced authorities to further slash traffic in Panama Canal
1–10 of 128 posts
Re: A drought has forced authorities to further slash traffic in Panama Canal
#2I was amazed to hear they relied on large amount of fresh water supply to refill the lochs for each ships passage.
Re: A drought has forced authorities to further slash traffic in Panama Canal
#3https://www.dw.com/en/will-climate-change-cut-off-the-panama... discusses some possible solutions:
> solutions [...] include water-saving sluices that would collect freshwater in basins so it can be reused. To this end, possibilities are being examined to develop and exploit other water sources near the canal. The construction of reservoirs and saltwater desalination plants are also being considered.
There's also:
> The transport route from Asia through the Panama Canal to the US' east coast can be partially rerouted through the Suez Canal
whoops.
Re: A drought has forced authorities to further slash traffic in Panama Canal
#4I was amazed to hear they relied on large amount of fresh water supply to refill the lochs for each ships passage.
Gatun Lake
Re: A drought has forced authorities to further slash traffic in Panama Canal
#5One note - they don’t pump water out and back into the locks from a neighboring storage. They flush the water. Each ship needs like 40 million gallons?
Maybe title should be insane wastes of water forces authorities…. :)
Re: A drought has forced authorities to further slash traffic in Panama Canal
#6Done to death in this other thread 3 days ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38991317
Re: A drought has forced authorities to further slash traffic in Panama Canal
#7One note - they don’t pump water out and back into the locks from a neighboring storage. They flush the water. Each ship needs like 40 million gallons? Maybe title should be insane wastes of water forces authorities…. :)
Isn’t that how all locks work? Or at least most?
I’ve always assumed the energy cost to pump the water would make it cost prohibitive, but I wonder how it compares to rerouting ships or moving containers over land.
Re: A drought has forced authorities to further slash traffic in Panama Canal
#8One note - they don’t pump water out and back into the locks from a neighboring storage. They flush the water. Each ship needs like 40 million gallons? Maybe title should be insane wastes of water forces authorities…. :)
Isn’t that how all locks work? Or at least most? I’ve always assumed the energy cost to pump the water would make it cost prohibitive, but I wonder how it compares to rerouting ships or moving containers over land.
Also relevant: Gatun Lake that these locks are fed from/part of is freshwater.
This makes recovering water from the locks problematic, since you can't feed it seawater.
Re: A drought has forced authorities to further slash traffic in Panama Canal
#9Can't the canal authorities reduce the water used somehow? If you paired up ships so that one going up the lock system is matched with one going down you could just pump the water back and forth from one lock to the other and back. Then way less water would be lost from the system.
The Falkirk wheel in Scotland can move boats with minimal electricity usage. Could a bigger one be built?
Re: A drought has forced authorities to further slash traffic in Panama Canal
#10One note - they don’t pump water out and back into the locks from a neighboring storage. They flush the water. Each ship needs like 40 million gallons? Maybe title should be insane wastes of water forces authorities…. :)
Isn’t that how all locks work? Or at least most? I’ve always assumed the energy cost to pump the water would make it cost prohibitive, but I wonder how it compares to rerouting ships or moving containers over land.
Ok, I’m no civil engineer, but couldn’t you design a siphon system that would only require opening and closing valves to capture the water without any pumping?